


Northlight

by Lasertits



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Guardians of the Galaxy - All Media Types
Genre: Canonical angsty backstory, Child Abandonment, Discussions of thereof, Gen, Post-Movie(s), Pre-Movie(s), So much worldbuilding, Space Absinth in Space Amsterdam, Worldbuilding, Yondu Lives, hipster cafe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-12-01 09:00:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11483043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lasertits/pseuds/Lasertits
Summary: "Hey! Ravager boy! Which tribe?"There at the end of the bar sat an ancient drunkard. What Yondu first took for hairstyle, was in fact a Tahlei, wrinkled and sagging to the side in a tired wave.The other Centaurian sat clutching a bottle, and a long black cigarette wobbled in the corner of his mouth when he talked."Auctioneers used to say Zatoan," Yondu said.Or, who on earth would sell their children?





	Northlight

  
Jube 3 was a moon zipping around an ice planet, so small it couldn't even maintain an atmosphere outside the force shields that shimmered and sparked, high over the spaceport, whenever bursts of radiation from the solar winds hit them.

They were on the permanent night side of it, as the day side was a scorching 500 degrees Fahrenheit at best.

It wasn't Knowhere, nor even one of the average ports in Ravager space. Just an outpost at the edge of Xandarian gentrification, crouching there in legal half-light and supplying the core worlds with the brothels, drugs, and illicit trade they needed to maintain their bright facades.

Mainly, it was spacer bars, and by Ravager standards it was tamer than a home for the elderly.

So Yondu had wandered off from Stakar and the gang, and ended up here. _Northlight_ _Bar_ , the sign proclaimed, a dive place by the end of the atmo field, with a domed transparisteel ceiling gone opaque with grime. But here and there, the acid fog outside had condensed and melted the dirt off in rivulets, creating an effect as if you saw the starscape through thick, uneven bars. The muted roar of ships landing and taking off shook the bottles behind the counter, made the glasses skip across the sticky tables bolted down along the walls.

Yondu had followed a girl here, one of those free love cult types dressed in pretty much body paint and glitter only, but she flitted away soon after he ordered. Planted a sweet-smelling kiss on him and danced off into the night, babbling excitedly about her cove sisters and a rave.

Since he was not in the mood for dancing, and since he'd already been served, he'd stayed behind.

He slightly regretted it now, she had been beautiful, but there were a thousand other spaceports with a thousand pretty things ahead, and blue leather and a flame patch was a sure ticket to getting laid.

"Hey! Ravager boy! Which tribe?"

He turned, immediately on guard. There at the end of the bar sat an ancient drunkard. What Yondu first took for hairstyle, was in fact a Tahlei, wrinkled and sagging to the side in a tired wave. The other Centaurian sat clutching a bottle, and a long black cigarette wobbled in the corner of his mouth when he talked, making sharp little glow runes in the gloom. He spoke Pidgin like a spacer, but for a slight click on the consonants.

"Thought you was Kree first, but not with those eyes. Don't move like a Kree either. No, you're one of my kind. Forest, too, I'd guess. So, which tribe you're from?"

"Auctioneers used to say Zatoan," Yondu said.

"Oh. Damn." The old man looked aghast. "You're one of _them_ , then. Never thought I'd see the day.. Irkai, me. That's my tribe. Or used to be. Name's Colrem."

"Yondu." He relaxed a little. The man seemed harmless enough, and some deep part of him felt comforted to see kin. "Seems to be common around here. Met at least three Colrems earlier tonight."

Colrem laughed, coughed, laughed again. "Not Centaurian, that. Community disgrace", and he gestured out with one arm, made a little bow. "Why I'm here, with a new name, making a fresh start."

He indicated the dive bar, the filthy port around them, the few souls sitting hunched over their drinks at the tables.

"But! Come here! Talk to an old man for a bit, will you?" Colrem patted the chair next to him. "Don't bother with that crap either, real good stuff's behind the counter." He nodded to the bartender, made a couple quick gestures with his fingers. The bartender's stone face didn't change, but she put a glass of something green before him.

"Thank you, darling."

The bartender grunted and went back to reading her pad by the dry ice container. The flipside of a chapter illustration showed a Xandarian lady in a flimsy gown, fainting in the arms of a muscular female Badoon.

"We were neighbours", he said, turning back to Yondu. "You lot lived higher up the mountain, we were closer to the plains. Sworn enemies, too, not that it matters. Neither Irkai nor Zatoans left now, it's all a few large tribes rather than many small, back home. Or so I've heard."

"Go on, son, try that thing out. Local specialty, that; Summer wine. Illegal on Xandar, so they import vatfuls of it over the smuggling routes. "

Yondu took a tentative sip. It was nice. Sweet and tart, with a kind of green, flowery aftertaste. It left a feeling of lazy, hot afternoons, of simply lying around in the sun. Not that he'd ever done that, but he'd seen it in holos. Even the bar around them seemed suffused in a forgiving, golden haze.

"Good, isn't it?" Colrem smiled. "Anyway."

He lit another of his long, black cigarettes on the stump of his first one. Took a deep drag. Offered Yondu the package, eyebrows raised, but Yondu declined.

"The Kree. Didn't see them, first time, just heard a rumor. Big crestless men, come in ships from the sky, paying well for live prisoners."

"So. We were locked in tribal wars. Forest tribe with forest tribe, everyone with the plains tribes. Been that way forever. And we'd had a couple bad dry seasons. The jungle lay quiet, nothing left to hunt but vermin. No fruits, all the edible roots and leaves already stripped for the communal pots. Forced to hunt further and further away, up on the cliffs and in enemy territory. Kree were a godsend, then. All you had to do was attack your neighbour, capture instead of kill, march them off to the traders and you were set. For another month or two, then you had to go again."

"They left, but next dry season they were back. Fewer of us now, sicker. Still no food. "We're only buying children", they said. So we dragged ourselves up, and we took our bows and arrows, and we went to war."

"Third season, there weren't many of us left. Shivering virus had carried them off, what hadn't been captured by enemies and sold. No wars anymore, nobody strong enough for that. This time, they came to us directly. Stood in the middle of the village, tall well-fed men and women, heavily armed. Had this box that translated for them, in a tinny monotone we barely understood. Now they were buying infants. Showed us their coffers, and there were rations, and medicine, and chit data sticks. Even the fossils we used for money among ourselves."

"So we sold our own pouchlings. Wouldn't have survived, anyway, we told ourselves. Better them than we all die. And we took what the Kree paid us, and we bartered for dried fish and algae cakes from the sea tribes, hardmilk and meat from the plains, and we just about scraped through."

"It wasn't easy. Lots of parents fought their village elders. Trio from my tribe took their infant and fled. Nearly doomed us all, losing that many hunters, but can't say I blame them."

"What." Yondu cleared his dry throat, took a sip of summer wine. It hit him with a wave of artificial contentment, but didn't help all that much. "What happened to them? The ones that fled?" His voice sounded odd to his own ears.

"I don't know", Colrem said gently. "Likely, the jungle took them. But maybe they escaped to the plains, or to the sea, and another tribe took them in. That kind of thing wasn't unheard of. But we never saw them again."

"After the Kree, we got together, all of us. We decided that next time they came, they'd get nothing for their trouble but death. No matter we were laughably outgunned. But they never showed. And life went on, and we had new children. Still we didn't forget you. Nobody ever found out what happened. Some said you were adopted by barren Kree couples, but I guess that's too naive?"

Yondu got up, chair scraping on the floor. He unzipped his jumpsuit angrily, shrugged it off one shoulder. Then he turned around and showed the scars, the family crest brandings all over his upper back. He hid them again.

Colrem stared at him in shocked silence, which made Yondu feel a wild, black kind of joy.

"This", and he pointed to his crest implant, "wasn't voluntary either. Nor sedated. I was ten."

"Way I see it," he continued, getting louder, "is there was only three honourable people in that tale, an' it sure weren't you lot. You're askin' me for sympathy? Forgiveness? Ya sold your own children to hell to save your worthless skins. Ain't no forgiveness to be had from here," he tapped his chest angrily, "nor from the piles of bones that are the rest of them, most likely. Thanks for the booze, but we're done talkin'"

"Son, wait. Please. We had no choice. Don't mean we don't regret it, don't mean we don't carry the shame always. Please sit down. I've never met one of you before, and I've been longing to."

"Know what? Me neither. Saw one other Centaurian, growing up. She was a corpse in the lime pits outside the arena. You're the first live one. Can't say it's been a pleasure."

"Son. I'm sorry. You have every right to be angry. But it's good to see you, still, alive and free ..and a Ravager, too! Glad I got to experience that before I died. "

"Go fuck yourself, you hypocritical old fart. And all the rest, and my parents, hell with ya'll too. Don't need ya."

The forcefield across the door, set there to keep the acid fog out, pinged cheerfully as he slammed through it. It had begun to rain, a light oily drizzle that smelled of burnt engine grease and some garbage sweetness. He lifted his face into it anyway, let it wash him clean. Fucking shithole of a moon, he thought. Fucking Centaurians.

If Stakar noticed how Yondu was greyer and quieter for a while, he wisely didn't comment. But he kept Yondu near, and his great, comfortably silent presence helped.

 

***

"I thought I told you not to let him down! Where did he go?"

Peter smacks one of the huge palm fronds aside, stares at the kaf drinking twentysomethings, seated at the rickety natural wood tables, until they fidget and look uncomfortable.

"He wanted to run around. Can't do that yet, myself. Not with this" and Yondu flicks the oxi-mask around his neck, the tube snaking under his coat. "Dont worry, he has knives, he can take care of himself."

"You armed him? He's a toddler!"

"So he needs an edge. Wasn't me neither, green girl did. He'll be fine. It's this crowd needs to be on guard, keep a hand on their valuables."

"Don't tell me you taught him to pickpocket!"

"Fine, I won't tell ya. Where's Bug?"

"She was right here! Oh for..Groot! Mantis! "

Peter starts diving into the alcove boots along the walls and lifting tablecloths. The crowd looks even more uncomfortable.

"Beautiful!" says Mantis, appearing from between the potted greenery at Yondu's side, iridescent shell-flitter-insect thing perched on her finger. She's not looking at it, though, but up at the ceiling. Yondu looks too.

It's a transparisteel dome, lifted by delicate steel struts. You can see the slowly revolving starscape beyond it, now and then interspersed with green oilslick waves of radiation messing with the atmo shield. It looks familiar.

He sees a napkin nearby, in the trembling fingers of some banker type. "Excuse me", he says politely, and plucks it. There's tasteful gold letters scrolling along the edge, wishing him welcome to Northlight Organic Café. It wants him to ask about their D-form amino acid muffins, whatever that is.

He crumples it in his hand, stares at the little ball of replicated paper.

" _May your hunting ever fruitful-be, in the lands beyond, old man_ ", he says softly. He only knows a word or two of Irkai so it's a funeral phrase in Maktakte, a tribe by the south pole of Centauri-IV, where the trees are black and it snows in winter. Somehow, he doesn't think Colrem would have minded.

"What?" squeaks the banker type. "What are you saying to me? I can't understand you!"

 

_____

 

This is sort of a prequel-postquel to Lost in Translation.  

Noorderlicht is an actual café in Amsterdam, but there's an old song where it's described as this dive bar, full of lost souls.

Just a plot bunny I got from a discussion, on why on earth anyone would sell their baby as a slave.

 


End file.
